


Not Hide His Face

by AVirtoMusae



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Angst, Asexual Character, Asexual John Laurens, Cissexism, Coming Out, Conservative adults, Demiboy John, Discussion of animal testing, Discussion of gender dysphoria, Discussion of gun control, Gen, Gender Dysphoria, Henry and Eleanor Laurens grrr, Heterocentrism, Liberal children, Martha Laurens is a staunch ally, Martha Laurens is awesome, Nonbinary Character, Nonbinary erasure, Nonbinary rights, Transgender Rights, Transphobia, ally - Freeform, biological essentialism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-08
Updated: 2016-05-08
Packaged: 2018-06-07 05:14:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6786865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AVirtoMusae/pseuds/AVirtoMusae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John and Martha Laurens defend transgender rights to Henry Laurens.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not Hide His Face

John thought there were many constants in the world, and he was pretty damn sure his family and its dynamics were one of them. There was his father, the bigoted emotionally-distant figure. There was his mother, the stereotyped ignorant conservative Christian. There was Martha, his closest ally in his family and the one with a tendency to fight with their mother. There was little Jemmy, the little boy who was still figuring out what he thought. And then there was John. The prodigal son for whom the term “son” only partially fit, the sole not cis-het child in an unaccepting family.

John swallowed and looked down at the food in front of him. His mother had tried cooking. Usually, the cook cooked for them, but tonight, it was Sunday, that one day a week that his parents had even half a heart and let the cook have the day off. Usually on Sundays, his mother’s Bible Study ran really long and his dad was working, so John would be able to cook for himself. But today, everything had lined up to make this the one Sunday this year that the entire family was able to sit down for dinner.

John was the opposite of thrilled to say the least. For one, his mother’s cooking tended to be awful, and unlike the cook, she made no efforts to honor his vegetarianism, so he was stuck eating overcooked sides and stale biscuits. For a second, dinners with everyone at the table usually ended in arguments, and tonight, he was able to see it from a mile away.

Martha had a school project that she was really excited for, and in some half-hearted attempt to feign caring, Henry Laurens had asked her about it. John, unlike Henry, knew about this project because he actually talked to Martha. The students in her tenth grade social studies class had to pick a hot-button topic and defend either a positive or negative opinion regarding it. Martha was the only other Laurens with liberal ideas, and she had chosen a topic quite daring: the positive position for transgender rights.

John was not sure whether to sigh in relief when his father asked, “So what topics were there?”

Martha bit her lip as she thought for a second. John knew her well enough to realize that she remembered a good chunk of them. “Animal testing.” 

John knew she thought this would be a relatively neutral topic, and John thought that it had the potential to be. It was the half-smirk on his father’s face that warned him that this would be far from neutral if his dad was given the chance. John could only half-listen to the conversation. 

John was still half-frozen in his chair and praying to whatever deity both that the conversation about transgender rights wouldn’t come and that it would come soon so he had an excuse to be pissed with his father. He was in limbo. That was the best word for it, dreading and anticipating. The inability to breath while not outright panicking. The knowledge there was no way the conversation could go well.

“-- testing has its place to protect humans. As long as the animals aren’t treated horribly. As long as the people aren’t malicious to the animals, which they have no reason to be. And as long as it’s mice and rats because no one cares about them.” Henry Laurens managed to sound passionate about the topic, and John had never heard him talk about animal testing before. John clenched his fists, nails digging crescents into the palms of his hands.

Martha pursed her lips. “If the testing stops immediately after they get hurt, the testing is not malicious, the animals are kept in good conditions, the animals are like mice, the things tested are in small patches on their sides, everything is healed properly.” It was clear she was not entirely okay with the idea, but her list of stipulations with the idea of permissible animal testing seemed to pacify their father.

“What other topics are there?!” Henry Laurens demanded, standing up and looking excited by the idea of blustering his opinions.

Martha was more hesitant in revealing another topic than she was the first time. “Gun control.” 

John wanted to facepalm. He’d heard his father go on ad nauseum about how gun control was wrong before. Sure enough, his father did exactly that.

“— government can’t limit our guns. It’s unConstitutional. Look at the second amendment. It’s written right there! People need to defend themselves! Look at all these school shootings — everyone needs to be armed to fight them.”

John’s gaze fell lower until he was staring down at his lap. Martha spoke up. “There needs to be something. There’s a reason the school shootings are happening in the first place. There need to be checks on the person’s mental state and background before allowing them guns!” John could feel Martha’s gaze on him as she looked to him for support.

“There needs to be a stricter definition of what guns are permitted for what usage.” It was quietly spoken, and John feared his father’s reaction. 

Henry Laurens actually growled. “Who gave you that opinion?”

Right. Because anyone who didn’t agree with Henry Laurens was clearly brainwashed. John clenched his jaw. “I am thinking that. I am in my own head, and therefore I’m making up my own mind, thank you very much. No one else can make up my mind for me.”

John chanced a look up. His father seemed about halfway between amused and irritated with John’s mini-speech. John swallowed and tried to shrink in on himself even more. And then, of course, came the question that John both dreaded and awaited: “So what is your project on, Martha?”

She grinned and tilted her chin up, and for a second, she reminded John of his boyfriend. “The positive for transgender rights.”

Henry and Eleanor Laurens stared at her incredulously. “So you’re trying to challenge yourself then, Martie? That’s good of you. You need to challenge yourself more. God knows your school is filled with underachievers and thugs, and it calls itself a private school,” Eleanor Laurens tsked.

“Actually,” Martha contradicted her, “it’s important. Everyone else is staying away from the more controversial topics, and someone needs to do it. Equality matters. Transgender people should be allowed to use their proper bathrooms.”

John ignored the fact his hands were literally shaking and forced himself to take deep breaths. He didn’t want to know what his family would say, knew that it would not be good, but perversely, he wanted to know. Wanted to know everything he’d known about his family was true. 

Henry Laurens snorted. Martha ignored him and continued, “And what does it matter who’s in the bathroom. You go and you get out. Nothing’s going to happen. It’s perfectly safe.”

Eleanor gave Martha a look. “I don’t want my daughter going into a bathroom a man can go into. It’s inappropriate. And men’ll be able to go around raping little girls.” Eleanor shook her head as if the idea of equality were the worst idea in the world. “If you were a mother, you’d understand.”

 _I didn’t realize being a mother automatically made someone ignorant and bigoted._ John continued forcing himself to breath. This was the same woman who had taken his asexuality much better than his father. The woman who had seeked to understand that and not condemn. As the conversation progressed, John felt progressively less and less comfortable in the skin. A few days earlier had been the worst day for that this week, the one where he had shut himself in the darkest and tried to ignore the existence of anything outside of his mind. The sensation of needing to escape his skin was back now, now as his two parents explained that clearly transgender rights shouldn’t be a thing.

“But men do sometimes talk to each other at the urinals —” Henry Laurens was explaining. 

John cleared his throat. “Can you all be quiet please? I want to say something. So there are these two guys at school, neither of them okay with people not cis-het, right? I know this guy,” the fact this guy was him was left unspoken, “and so he comes out to one of these guys after hearing the person say some really homophobic remarks. The guy tells this guy I know he’s going to hell. This guy I know comes out to this other guy, too. This guy admits he isn’t comfortable with it but that he still respects said guy as a person. See, we need more respect. So what does it matter who we are so long as we can respect each other?” 

John took a deep breath. Eleanor Laurens huffed. “Well, it’s still not right. Men shouldn’t be given the opportunity to go around raping women. North Carolina has it right. People belong in their own bathrooms.”

And then something in John snapped, and he couldn’t take it anymore. “Look, out of the five of us, I think I have the most right to judge whether trans people should be allowed to use the bathroom of their gender. I’m a demiboy. Have you ever been forced to go into a bathroom you’re not entirely comfortable with every single time you want to go to the bathroom in public? No? Well, I have, and it’s uncomfortable. I hate using the men’s bathroom. I hate being forced into a bathroom for a group of people I’m not a part of! I feel so uncomfortable being in there if there’s even one other man in there. So yes, we should have gender-neutral bathrooms because it is not okay to force people through this just pee or poop!”

“I disagree. You’re not a demiboy. God gave you a penis, so you’re a boy. You’re a boy, so you should use the men's restroom,” Eleanor informed him, giving him a disgusted look.

“Gender and sex are not the same thing. Sex is the body, and gender is who you are in the inside. They don’t have to line up,” John explained vehemently. He sat up a little straighter in his chair.

“The idea of gender fluidity didn’t exist before the sixties,” Henry Laurens explained as thouh giving a history lesson. “It’s a new thing. Everyone fit just fine with sex and gender the same thing before.” Actually, no, John could think of so many cultures where that was not even the case.

John’s nostrils flared. “Maybe there weren’t terms for it, but surely people would have felt it before. There’s a reason people came up with terms for it.” A part of John wanted to talk about that awful feeling of knowing he didn’t fit into the gender binary but not being able to find a word that fit. He could remember how when he finally found the term “demi-boy” and how he had felt like _oh my God, that’s me!_ , that relief was something beyond words.

Henry Laurens just shook his head. Eleanor chimed in, “I’ve had to use the men’s restroom a couple of times. I’m not a guy. No one else was there, so it was perfectly wholesome.” Because that was exactly the same thing as being forced into the wrong bathroom every time. Martha and John exchanged an incredulous look.

John could feel his eyes burning, stinging, pricking with tears, and he hated it. He bit on his lip to try to stop it. For a second, nobody spoke, but by some subconscious thought, they all chose that moment to get up and start clearing the table. Sensing the awkwardness, Jemmy, who’d thus far been silent, asked, “Mom, can we go to Staples? I need a couple more pens for tomorrow.”

With that, the conversation officially turned to whether or not it was an okay time to drive to Staples, and John was able to slip out to the front porch with his phone.

_to alex <3: alex??? you there???_

_from alex <3: john wassup?_

_to alex <3: m&g cool w/me sleeping over?_

_from alex <3: yeah. whats wrong?_

_to alex <3: be there in a min_

_Sent at 8:42, October 26_

**Author's Note:**

> Please understand this is based off a true story. Ergo while not everything in this fic is true, much of it, including some of the dialogue, the set-up, and the attitudes portrayed, is real. I apologize if not all of this makes sense. I have slept fewer than ten hours of the last forty-eight and spent the night doing homework. Also, I might make this a series if someone gives me prompts for one-shots. ;)
> 
> As always, feedback is appreciated.
>
>> A Virto Musae  
> By the Virtue of the Muse


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